Scary Polls and Scary Pols

Welcome beg to Beg to Differ, the Bulwark weekly roundtable discussion, featuring civil conversation across the political spectrum. We range from center left to center right. I’m Mona Charen, syndicated columnist and policy editor at the Bulwark, and I’m joined by our regulars, Bill Galston of the Philippines institution in the Wall Street Journal and Linda Chavez of the Nescannon Center. The Bulwark Will Saletan is sitting in week for Damon Linker. And our special guest is Chris Saliza, formerly of the Washington Post and CNN, who now writes the sub stack newsletter, so what?

Welcome one and all. Well, we, had an election this week that went extremely well for Democrats and a lot of people are busily turning out hot takes. But one of my favorites was from our very own Chris Saliza. So, Chris, you wrote earlier this week about the troubling poll numbers for Biden and then the election results, but let’s talk first about the whole business of how abortion is playing in twenty twenty three and whether that means that going forward, Democrats have a what’s the magical sword that one that cuts the gordian knot, that it’s like the secret thing that will be the

I know what you mean.

Secret weapon for the Democrats in in twenty twenty four. So, alright. Well, that was a very awkward question, but you get my point.

We I absolutely get it. To go back, I remember when the DOB’s decision happened in twenty twenty two, there was a lot of speculation about, you know, what would this do to the Pluto then we had the midterm elections where there was a red wave predicted, but it did not materialize and abortion was credited with sort of driving the Democratic base, and and I would say cutting across political affiliation, particularly among women. And so I think that In the intervening year, I think Republicans fooled themselves whether knowingly or unknowingly fool themselves into thinking that, well, sure that was twenty twenty two. You know, but now it’s Joe Biden and he’s not popular and people don’t think the economy is doing well, even though as Jonathan last argues regularly, it actually is doing quite well. But people don’t think that and that’s what this election is gonna be about.

And I think what Tuesday was is a reminder that abortion is still a very relevant political topic for lots and lots of people. Like, the obvious one is in Ohio with issue one. Ohio is not a swing state anymore. This is a Republican state. Fifty eight percent of people, voted to codify abortion into the state constitution.

The seventh state that it’s happened, and I’ll note four of those seven states, including Ohio, or states Joe Biden lost in twenty twenty. So it’s not happening on a liberal playing field. This is happening in conservative and liberal states. But I also think Virginia is a good example. It’s possible to draw too many conclusions from Virginia, but I think one conclusion you can draw is that Glenn Yonkin living here and seeing all the ads.

Glenn Yonken and Republicans made a big thing about if we have control of all three chambers of the governorship and the state legislature. We will be able to pass a fifteen week abortion ban, which is what people want, and it’s a common sense solution, and it’s a good thing to do post ops. And, like, there’s clearly was a rejection of that logic, which I think leaves Republicans and are really interesting slash troubling place for them, which is I don’t know that they have a way to successfully talk about the issue of abortion in a political sense with the election one year from now. And and I think that’s a major concern. I actually out to Mike Murphy, a Republican consultant.

We’re doing a a chat that I’m gonna post on my sub stack just about like what what could the message be or should the message be? Don’t talk about abortion.

Yeah. So that’s a really interesting point. Bill Goldstein, I’m gonna bring you in here. Look, one of the, suppositions after Dobs was that Republicans just needed to carve out the reasonableness lane. They needed to say, well, you know, we’re not the crazy ones.

We’re for moderate limitations on abortion are not absolute bands. And Glenn Youngen arguably tested this hypothesis, and he said that if he were to gain control of both houses of the legislature. And with him as governor, they would pass a fifteen week limit. He he didn’t want to even use the word ban. Limit on on abortion availability.

And so that was going to be the reasonable position, but it turns out that it did not work and that part of the reason may be that voters do not trust Republicans on this issue. They don’t trust them to be satisfied with a fifteen week limit. Because of the vibes they’re getting from the rest of the Republican party. What what’s your sense of it?

Well, there’s an interesting Sarah Longwell Democrats say that they’re only interested in taxing people in the very upper income brackets, majority of Americans say they’re coming for us.

Yep.

Don’t believe what they’re saying. And I think that something parallel is happening with Republicans on abortion. And they may talk about reasonable limitations, but a lot of people, in particular, a lot of suburban women, here they’re coming for us. And so thinking about the Republican debate, the only person who articulated a stance that I think might parse in a general election is Nikki Haley. It’s sure a lot better than anything else on offer from Republicans.

And so at the very least, They have to abandon talk of a national standard. And then they have to try to express a kind of tolerance on the issue. A genuine tolerance

for disagreements.

Well, look, Yep. There yeah. The reason I’m focusing on Nikki Haley is that it sounds genuine coming out of her mouth. Whatever it may be you know, the underlying thoughts and feelings and simply acknowledging the fact that there are disagreements on this issue within the Republican Party and within the country, and that a one size fits all solution is bound to intensify the conflict and that the opinions of people in states need to be respected whatever we think of the outcome of these votes. If there’s any other way that Republicans could talk about the issue without being damaged in the process.

I have yet to hear it.

So Will Saletan Republicans are clearly struggling with this, even some hosts on Fox News were apparently saying we need to change our messaging, and there are, you know, memos going out from political consultants suggesting different ways to handle this issue of abortion because it’s been pretty clear cut since Dobs was decided every time voters have had a say, they have voted to expand the right to abortion not to constrict it. So it does say something about our democracy that at least in this regard, it’s working. Right? I mean, the people are getting what they want. Eventually, the voters do get their way, and parties are forced to adjust.

No?

No. I agree with that. Part of the strangeness about abortion is and this is where Dobbs comes in. We have been living during Roe in an artificial political universe. In which ordinary people voters can express their moral views about abortion, knowing all the while, that legally abortion rights were protected by the Supreme Court.

Now they may have been unhappy with abortion morally the whole time. But they didn’t really have to think about that contradiction that many of them have in their head. So when dobs came along and repealed Roe, That ended the artificial world. And now, a lot of people who are anti abortion, but pro choice have to actually vote that way. Right?

The Supreme Court’s not gonna protect it for them. And so in these red states, where there are a lot of conservative people, people who don’t like government. They want less government. But these people, many of them are pro choice for the same reason. They don’t like government messing in their lives.

It’s what Bill said. It is on taxes. They don’t want the government to take their money. On guns, they don’t want the government to take to take their guns. And on abortion, they don’t want the government telling them what to do, even if what they do isn’t to choose the abortion.

So now we live in a real world where people have to vote that way, and that’s why all of these Republicans and Republican, positions on ballot measures are losing. Those anti abortion pro choice voters are voting pro choice.

Yep. Linda, I I just wanna say a word about the Supreme Court because we hear a lot from people Jonathan Last that this is a radical Supreme Court that I I’ve heard it once I’ve heard it five thousand times that it took away a right and that people hate it when you take away their rights and so on. Fifty year established right. And my view is actually that The dobbs decision was not nearly as radical as Roe itself was, that row, the equivalence would have been that if this Supreme Court had been as radical as the Roe Court, it would have found a right to life in the con institution and forbidden states from permitting abortion. And then the people who objected to that ruling and and disagreed with it would have had to wait for the constitution of an entirely new court to overturn the previous ruling, which is what happened in Roe Roe found this right in the constitution, and therefore prohibited states from acting.

And so in effect, Dobbs was much less radical than Roe. Dobbs did turn it back to the people and to their elected representatives, and they are acting on it. And so, you know, that I think is a is point that needs to be made again and again. This was not a radical act by the Supreme Court. It really did return power to the people.

But let me ask you a different thing now that I’m off soapbox. Let me ask you though about how this Will Saletan. Do you suppose in the twenty twenty four race because a lot of people believe that Donald Trump is actually better situated than most Republicans to triangulate on this. You know, the he’ll say, oh, you know, I think what Ron DeSantis did was terrible in Florida, and that’s too extreme. And I’m actually gonna put everybody together.

He’s actually said this. I’m gonna put everybody together in a room. We’re gonna come up with a wonderful compromise. It’s gonna make everybody so happy. And, you know, he can, vitiate the effects.

What do

you think? That’s not

gonna happen. No. Which part that he he won’t say it or he won’t be able to do it?

No. No. No. That he that he won’t possibly be able to do it. Well, of course.

The reason that, Nikki Haley suggested, in the debate this week. There is just such an enormous gap between those who believe in an absolute right to abortion and those who believe that abortion is killing an unborn child. You’re never going to reconcile those two extremes and those extremes do not represent the great majority of American views. I do think that you’re right that Donald Trump is better positioned because nobody who supports him really cares what he says. I mean, he could say one thing today and another thing tomorrow and a third thing the next day.

And they can all be mutually inconsistent, and it doesn’t seem to matter to the people who support him. So I think he will try to, pretend suddenly that, you know, he’s more pro choice than than he was and for reasons that I can’t quite under stand, those in the pro life movement will just sort of ignore that and say, well, he gave us the Dops decision. But the basic line is I think your analysis of the legal question is absolutely accurate. I think that The idea that somewhere in the penumbra, there was this absolute right to abortion, in the constitution, there was a right to privacy in that compass abortion as well. I mean, if you go back and read the original row decision, it didn’t make a whole lot of sense legally.

And so I think the idea of saying that there is no absolute right in the constitution to abortion does leave room for there to be legislation either to grant a right to abortion or to limit abortion in certain circumstances And given our system and given the huge cultural divide in this country, I think the idea of returning it to the states makes sense. The problem for the Republicans is that I think they misunderstood where most people are on abortion. And as you suggest or as someone else suggested, you know, you can be both pro life and pro choice at the same time, believing that, abortion is wrong, but also believing that this is a choice that has to be made by individuals in consultation with their family and doctors and that you don’t want government intervening. I think actually Chris Christie said it well on the debate stage. She said, you know, you’re you’re gonna have states where they’re gonna be very, very strict restrictions on abortions.

And there are going to be other states where you have an absolute right to abortion. And that this is part of what it means to live in a federalist system. So I think this will be Bulwark through. I think what we’re seeing is that the pro choice activists have been very smart. To organize to try to get this on the ballot, and I think it will play a role in twenty twenty four.

And regardless of what it is that Donald Trump says or doesn’t say. If abortion is on the ballot in a battleground state, it’s going to hurt the Republicans, including Donald Trump. If he’s the nominee.

And there are efforts to put abortion measures on the ballot in Arizona, at least, and and perhaps other, battleground states so that might juice turnout among Democrats and independents who are concerned about that issue and even some Republicans.

As by the way, Mona, the George w Bush forces did in two thousand and four with the anti gay marriage initiatives. So

You know, that’s a well practiced technique in politics. So So we will see. Well, chrysalis, I wanna come back to you on the matter of the series of polls that before election night had Democrats quite panicked, and some people saying that that Biden actually ought to drop out because the times Siena Poe showed that, his popularity is really quite low, that people do regard him as too old, emphatically so large numbers even though they don’t say the same thing about Trump, who’s only three years younger, etcetera. And then we had the polling showing Trump ahead in what was it? Four out of five or five out of six, swing states.

So tell us how to look at these polls.

Yeah. So I think two things can be true at the same time. One is, I do think Donald Trump is slightly ahead at this point, and I’d not just because of the time Sienna poll. I mean, one thing that I I would know is while those polls got a ton of attention and rightly so, It’s not drastically inconsistent with sort of what we found. I mean Gallup had Biden’s approval at thirty seven percent.

Seventy five percent among Democrats. CNN had a poll where Trump was up forty nine forty five nationally. So I think that these results do suggest that at today, and I think people tend to extrapolate and say, well, this poll is predictive. No. It’s a snapshot in time today.

Donald Trump is a slight favorite over Joe Biden. So that is one thing that is true. I think the other thing that is fundamentally true, and I think people reasonable people can disagree about this, but my belief is despite number one, Number two, that is true, is Joe Biden is the strongest option for Democrats at this point, which is I think there is always a grasses greener vibe, you know, well, if Gretchen Whitmer were running or if Gavin Newsom were running or Josh Shapiro in Pennsylvania were running, we’d be winning by thirty points. You know, I I think the country is evenly divided enough that we’re probably talking about a fifty one forty nine, fifty two forty eight overall national popular vote no matter who Democrats nominate. You know, I I I don’t think that changes all that much and then of course it’s the devil you know argument.

Like, I all of these people, in theory, a different candidate who is not as old, who doesn’t sort of look as old, talk as old, sort of feel as old as Joe Biden wouldn’t be a good idea for Democrats, but I totally get that in a vacuum. The problem is that pick a candidate. Let’s just say Gretchen Whitmer. That candidate has warts like we all do. Yep.

Now we don’t know as many of as many of them about her yet she hasn’t gotten the national spotlight on her as brightly as she absolutely would if she was the Democratic presidential nominee. I think there would be this is true for Josh Shapiro. This is true for Gavin Newsom. I think there would be a, well, sure they were a governor, but but are they up to being president? There would be a a credibility gap, you know, are they ready for this job?

Are they experienced enough? Do they know enough about foreign policy? All of those things, Joe Biden checks those boxes inherently. Plus, by the way, the added problem of what it would look like if Joe Biden, all of a sudden, ditched his candidacy. And Democrats replaced him.

I’m gonna look like utter panic on their side. So I just think it is true. Trump is ahead slightly right now. It is also true that Biden is the best possible nominee for Democrats in this moment against Donald Trump and what we know is coming, in the race. And so You know, I think, we probably put too much emphasis on any one set of polls, but I would also add the polling generally speaking has shown that people think Joe Biden is too old to be president and that’s a major stumbling block for them and that’s not new in the New York Times CNN poll.

That’s been true for two years.

Yep. Okay. I have a question for our two Democrats. Will Salatin and Will Saletan, and it’s this. The idea that Biden would say, you know, on Monday morning that having thought it all over and consulted with his family, he’s not going to run for reelection.

The likeliest outcome of that would be, I think, and tell me if you think I’m wrong, that Kamala Harris would get the nomination, and who thinks that she would be a stronger candidate than Joe Biden. Start with you, Will Saletan.

Well, this is a Fox News fever dream. I mean, I if for for Democrats who don’t watch Fox News, this is what they talk about all the time. Joe Biden is He’s not even running things anyway. He’s going to drop out. He won’t be the nominee.

It’ll be Kamala Harris. And you can see Nikki Haley mainstreaming this idea in debates and other forums. You know, this is not gonna happen. If it did happen, yes, Kamala Harris is a weaker candidate by virtually every poll that I’ve seen. In the general election than than Biden is.

But no. That’s not gonna happen. The debate is really whether to keep Biden or not. And I mean, I basically agree with Chris’s analysis of the polls. The Biden has, you know, above all, he has the age problem.

That’s not gonna get any better. The alternatives are gonna have negatives that we haven’t anticipated. The big thing that I really want other Democrats to take away from these polls is If you are a progressive person and you hang out with other progressive people, and you think Joe Biden is doing great. And part of the reason you think he’s doing great is because all your friends are for him. That’s what these polls are for.

These polls are a reality check. And Chris is exactly right. The first one came out and people said, oh, we don’t believe these polls. They’re you. They’re asking the wrong people.

Another one comes out. Another one, they are piling up, and they are all telling you a message. And the message is We are in serious trouble and serious danger of Donald Trump becoming president again, and we can debate all we want about how to deal with that which candidate to put forward and how and what the message should be, but do not believe that your friends are the electorate. They are not.

Okay, Bill. I’m gonna change your question because of what Will said, and it’s this. I’ve argued that the one and only thing that Biden can do about his greatest weakness, which is the perception that he is old and senile, while he is old, but that he’s senile, which he is not, is that he needs to be much more engaged. I think we’ve talked about this before, but he has not inhabited the office in the way that people expect a president to do He doesn’t fill it out, and he needs to do more of that. People need to see more of him.

They need to be reassured that he is not, in fact, senile or doddering. What do you think?

No disagreement there. That’s a necessary condition, but I think not a sufficient condition.

Okay.

And what worries me about the Biden campaign is that they are not worried enough about the president’s vulnerabilities beyond the age issue. They don’t seem to me to be doing anything to change course and shore up the president’s weaknesses in areas such as immigration. And crime.

Mhmm.

To say nothing of the fact that the bidenomics messaging can pain has been a total flop for a totally predictable reason. Namely that they’re talking about all of the things that they think The American people should be focused on when they think about the economy, but in fact are not focused on nearly as much as they are on high prices. And I say high prices because I inserted a question into a poll that came out last month asking a very simple question. Yeah. When you hear the phrase inflation, what do you think about?

Does that mean to you that prices are rising too rapidly or that the prices are too damn high? And more people said the latter than the former. And so my recommendation to the Biden campaign in the piece that I published in the journal was that they go on the offensive against high prices, and ask some questions. You know, why are automakers discontinuing low price models, making it very difficult for working class and middle class people to afford a new car. Why aren’t home builders building?

More entry level homes. Why are the major food manufacturers of manufacturers of processed food jacking up prices at twice the overall rate of inflation in the United States. And and this is an area to go populist with a vengeance and make the anti monopoly anti duopoly argument and to make the argument that an economy that works for working people is an economy that gives them some choices they can afford. But they’re just sitting there and doing nothing. And that is the thing that worries me most of all.

Yeah. Those are great questions. I I would throw in one more. This would be directed toward Biden himself. Why doesn’t he cut tariffs?

I mean, tariffs are artificially holding up prices. They hurt the poorest people more and working class people much more than they hurt upper income people. That’s a good populist message despite what people may imagine because Trump used it to his advantage when he imposed these tariffs, but that’s something Biden could do tomorrow. Alright, Linda. So what was your takeaway from the debate that the whole thing was pointless, be because of the polls on who’s ahead?

The guy who wasn’t there?

Right. The guy is who wasn’t there is the only, you know, I mean, you you’ve finally, they’ve narrowed it down to what? Five.

Yep.

But, what does it matter when the the one who is forty, fifty points ahead and some some polls won’t even dain to appear on the stage? So and the other thing is that they were all vying for, with each other for second place. And I’m not quite sure. You know, this isn’t the Olympics. They don’t get a silver medal for coming in second.

Maybe they, you know, get asked to be vice president on Trump’s ticket, but they were busy attacking each other instead of attacking Trump. And so, you know, I I just don’t think that it was at all useful. On the other hand, I think Nikki Haley continued to show herself very adept. I thought she, did a good job last night. I thought she was especially strong on the abortion issue know, if the Republicans are looking for a new message, the respect, your opponent’s point of view.

And I have my position. You have yours and we don’t have to demonize each other. But she was good on other issues too. She was very effective. I thought on Ukraine.

I thought she was good on China. So, you know, I mean, in another world, this would matter, and she would be, you know, coming to the fore. Is it

On Earth two point o, she’d be ahead by fifty points.

Well, that’s right. But, you know, but look, I know that I am an eternal optimist on this issue. But I keep thinking that at some point, you know, not the hardcore mega people. They’re never gonna give up on Trump. But the more moderate suburban voters, the independents who Trump absolutely has to win a portion of in order to to win the presidency that as we move forward with these trials that it’s going to have an effect And I think we will at least see the trial in Washington DC, the federal trial having to do with Trump’s role in January sixth.

I think the the state, battle in in Georgia, the fact that you’ve got people Now having accepted guilty, please. You know, we we now know that Mark Meadows is cooperating to some degree. This is going to I think eventually have some impact. At least that’s my hope. I keep believing that people are saying, and they realize what a danger this man is, and how could so many people be so wrong.

But, you know, could be that It’s just me that’s wrong.

Well, it’s a it’s thank god. It’s still a year away. Crystal is a Watching the Florida governor Ron DeSantis Ron DeSantis, I’m not sure how he’s pronouncing it this week. I’m reminded of a line from Will Saletan Buckley Junior who once said of someone that he was a pyromaniac in a field of straw men. So they were discussing Ukraine And what does DeSantis do?

But he says, we are not going to send your daughters and sons to Ukraine. I am going to send troops to our southern border. Well, nobody, exactly nobody has proposed sending our sons and daughters to Ukraine, straw man, and he does this consistently. But, what was your sense? I’ve gotten that off my chest.

One of my favorite things to do after a debate is to see what and I used to use Twitter for this, and I don’t really do it as much anymore. I kinda wait until people write things, but see who thought Who was good? Yeah. And one of the things that I’m always fascinated by is a lot of people last night thought Ron DeSantis was quite good. And and it made me think Maybe I’m missing something with him because, you know, people have said he’s pretty good in these debates and I just don’t really see it.

I will confess. I had an event last night. I watched a recording of the debate this morning, so I don’t know if that changed my opinion. But it just I don’t get it. It feels like whether it’s Ukraine or wokeness or Trump.

I I don’t have a sense of what Ron DeSantis is really running on? What is the message? What is, like, it feels like a bunch of tactics but not any real strategy. I don’t know what everything adds up to, with the sandisk. I I’ve written and and believe that ultimately the problem with Ron DeSantis is Rhonda Santos.

We can we can talk about, oh, his message isn’t that great or, you know, he had all these campaign staff issues and he had to replace people. Like, ultimately, the metaphor I use is a dog food metaphor. Just stick with me. So you wanna start a dog food company. Youth bring in best in class sales, best in class marketing.

You spend a ton of money on all that stuff. You know, everyone is so everyone who owns is aware that there is a new dog food on the market. They go out. They’re excited. They buy it for their dog.

They give it to the dog. And the dog turns up its nose at that dog food. Well, then it doesn’t matter how good the marketing and sales and and, you know, social media campaigns are because the dog doesn’t like the dog food. Ron DeSantis is the dog food. He had all the appearance of the I who was going to be the Trump alternative, except when voters actually saw and met him.

I didn’t like him. So I just don’t know how you change that. Again, I criticize this messaging, but that’s not really a messaging problem as much as it is a candidate problem. So, you know, for me, Nikki Hilly is going to continue to be the star of these debates because she is the best debater, the most charismatic, the most able. I think she’s the most comfortable in her skin on the stage, Ron DeSantis doesn’t strike me as particularly comfortable in his skin, particularly comfortable with this message.

And I just don’t think that when the bright lights turned on for Ron DeSantis, I don’t think he was able to perform. And I and I just I come back to that over and over again with him.

Right. Right. And first of all, Chris, that analogy to dog food is my new favorite analogy of the campaign. I’m gonna steal that.

I’m glad you like it. I’m glad you like it. I use it I use it somewhat sparingly, but I do think it is like a pretty accurate description.

I mean, I have heard people describe Ron DeSantis as dog food, but not with the whole metaphor that you the way you laid it out with the marketing. There’s lots of dog references with the santas. Well, part of part of why I love it though is is that, when I think about it, Trump is kind of the opposite. It is Trump was this thing that was served up in twenty sixteen and all the pundit class looked at him and said, oh my god. This is disgusting.

No one would ever want this. And then they served it to the Republican electorate, and they devoured it. And so there there were a lot of people who to this day will stand by Trump because no matter what he does that you know, what I think of as decent people find repellent, voters seem to love it and not care about any of the anyway. Let me just set that aside. About Ron DeSantis.

Definitely. The problem is Ron DeSantis. The problem is he doesn’t have the physical ability to do this job of of attracting voters and getting elected. And that is the whole job. I mean, if you think back to other candidates like George w Bush, he didn’t have a lot going for him in terms of substance But he was very likable.

And so Republicans recognized we’re gonna put this guy out because people just like him. They’ll vote for Ron DeSantis is the opposite. You put a policy paper in front of him. You put a speech in front of him, and he just destroys it. People, you know, he he can’t do that job.

And if you can’t do that job, you pretty much need to get out. The thing that I really noticed in this debate, substance wise, was there used to be you know, four or five hawks, foreign policy hawks in the Republican field. One of the reasons why I like to watch these debates, even though Trump isn’t in them, is you sort of get a sense of the vibe inside the party. Oh my god. How are we gonna handle the changing abortion issue?

How are we gonna handle the changing Israel issue? The changing Ukraine issue. And what’s going on right now is a political wind is blowing in that party against Ukraine and in favor of isolationism. And Mike Pence is gone. Ace Hutchinson is off the stage.

Will Hurd never got on the stage. And Ron DeSantis in this debate, was even more isolationist than he has been before. And what he talked about, that that thing you referenced, Mona, exactly right. He suggested that Zelensky was trying to have America send troops over there when Zelensky has said exactly the opposite that we need you to support us to fight this war so you don’t get forced into a NATO country where you have an article five obligation. Right?

So that happened. And Tim Scott, Tim Scott, who would have been the third the third foreign policy hawks on stage along with Christie and Haley. He was waffling. He was starting to say things like, well, you know, I I wouldn’t support more aid until we can justified to the American public, where all the money is going, which is straight out of the House Republican Conference. So that isolationist wing, if you think about it, trump, Ramaswamy?

DeSantis? That’s about seventy five percent of vote of Republican voters where they are. Nikki Haley and Chris Christie are about ten percent. There’s an isolationist wind blowing in this party, and it’s blowing over the hogs.

Alright. Will Saletan, this came up last week that, Republicans are very eager to help Israel although the speaker of the house wasn’t so eager to help Israel that he didn’t mind putting a poison pill into the legislation. But that’s their carve out, basically, for now. Their carve out is, yeah, they wanna help Israel don’t wanna help anybody else. They don’t wanna help Ukraine.

And, even the, candidate who, I think, even you were a little bit enthusiastic about a few weeks or months ago. Tim Scott, he’s kinda folding, you know, folding, and that kind of gives you a sense of where the party is trending. Right?

No doubt. I think I was on the right track generally, but I picked the wrong South Sarah Longwell. My sense was that, DeSantis did a better job last night than he had previously. And that for me was extremely bad news. Let me explain.

There is exactly one way that Donald Trump at the end is not the nominee of the Republican Party. And that will be the Gary Hart scenario. Haley has to come in a strong second in Iowa Then goes to New Hampshire with a halo around her. All of the independents are most of them decide that there’s no action on the democratic side that they’re particularly interested in. So they move over to the Republican primary and vote for her.

She wins in New Hampshire, and then we have a new race. That is the only hope that decent people can have, for the Republican Party’s nomination process. And if DeSantis did well enough to get people to give him a second look in Iowa, then I think that will be really bad news for the party and the country. I don’t know whether anybody’s paying attention, frankly. My hunch is that not a lot of people watched the third debate.

I could be wrong about that. I haven’t seen the numbers maybe somebody else has. But if there can’t be a quick coalescing around Haley as the alternative to Trump, then we’re gonna have a rematch. And, there was a Bimbo on a boat, Linda. But that was in nineteen eighty eight, not nineteen eighty four.

I’m talking about nineteen eighty four, which I lived through because I was Walter Mandell’s policy director. And, I remember very distinctly what happened between Gary Hart’s surprise second place finish in Iowa and the New Hampshire primary a week later, a lot can happen. So stay tuned.

Well, okay, Chris. Do you want to comment on that because it is the view of Sarah Longwell and Jonathan Last and Tim Miller, all from the bulwark, that, we need DeSantis in Iowa to continue drawing some votes because he draws from the same pool as Trump. If he’s not there, his voters go to Trump. They don’t go to Haley. So it’s better for him to at least survive until New Hampshire.

I think that’s right. By the way, I think for Ron DeSantis ego, probably he’s going to stay in through Iowa. You know, they have consistently moved the goal post expectation wise. It was he’s gonna win Iowa, then it was, well, if he comes in first or second in Iowa, that’s good. And and I think now where they are is Well, he’s just gonna do well in Iowa.

Yeah.

You know, they do that because they see polling that suggests, well, we may be in some trouble. But, yeah, I think that’s right. I do think that people who assume that if everyone got out, you know, this was about two weeks ago, there was a big movement George will wrote about it and others, big, big movement. We need to get everyone out of the race other than Nikki Haley and Donald Trump, and that’s the way as of today, that’s the way that you win. And I actually think it’s a more complicated than that just because if you look at polling to your point, Mona, you know, just the Iowa poll, the DuPont register poll that came out a few weeks ago.

The the number of DeSantis supporters who say Trump is their second choice is much higher than the number of DeSantis supporters who say Nikki Haley or any other candidate. Is their second choice. So, you know, I I think the idea that well, if we just had one candidate unite behind, then all of their vote would be masked behind that candidate. In this case, Haley, and that number would make a serious run at Trump I think oversimplifies sort of the calculations that voters make. Now I do think to Bill’s point, I I do think If you are looking for a way that Donald Trump isn’t the nominee, it is exactly what Bill outlined.

I don’t think anyone other than Haley has any real chance. I would say Haley’s chances ten ten percent. You know, it’s a it’s a punchers chance. She’s sort of in the ring. Gee could she land a blow that, you know, stuns him in Iowa, New Hampshire sure, but I think that it has to be a process.

And I think that DeSantis staying in at least through Iowa is part of that process to sort of bifurcate people who are in the Trump world. Let’s say the same thing about Vikramaswamy. Right? Like, eventually, he’s gonna get out and endorse Trump. The question is when and has Haley taken off enough by that point if she ever does take off.

So I I just think it’s a more complicated calculation than many people are sort of leaving mass that, well, if we just got everyone out of the race, he would lose.

Okay. Let’s, take, few minutes though, to discuss the strains within the democratic coalition regarding Israel and Gaza and Biden’s handling of it. Because We have seen in the past month, a tremendous generational divide open up. That is people who are in the silent generation or baby boomers and even generation x, large majorities, tilt toward Israel and approve of Biden’s handling of this situation. But when you get down to, generation z and millennials, Then you get to, you know, fewer than half support and so and depending on which poll you look at, some of them look even more stark than that.

So the question is, in a presumably tight race in twenty twenty four, when Joe Biden cannot afford to lose any constituency that voted for him in twenty twenty, could he be in trouble with younger voters because of the economy, but also partly because of this war. What do you think Will Saletan?

So I’m a deep skeptic that this issue is going to cut that much politically. Because I think it’s just overwhelmed. And I think the polling shows that by concerns about the economy or general concerns about Joe Biden’s age or The fact that Donald Trump is a threat to American democracy and the rule of law. There are a lot of other issues that I think are gonna overwhelm it. In a place like Michigan, maybe enough, you know, Palestinian Americans, Muslim Americans vote against Joe Biden or stay home that it makes a difference.

But I’m I’m very skeptical about that. I am, however, very interested in the generational divide that you’re talking about, Mona, because first of all, I have this debate in my own house Like, I’m arguing with my son, you know, who’s and I’m realizing how how different it is, how different one’s impression, of Israel is. I’m talking about among Jews. I’m Jewish. Depending on when you grew up and what you experienced.

Let’s talk about Joe Biden for a second. Joe Biden was born in nineteen forty two. Okay. He was alive. He was six years old when Israel came into existence as a modern country.

Right? He was, you know, twenty five years old when the sixty seven war happened. He’s thirty, thirty one years old, when the seventy three war happens. So he’s seen Israel under threat his whole life. And he saw when there wasn’t in Israel, and his father told him about the Holocaust and all that.

Right? That’s Joe Biden’s experience. It was formative. I’m younger, obviously. My son is even younger.

My son has no experience of Israel under under, you know, mortal threat. He wasn’t around for any of those wars. Right? And he has only seen Israel the Bulwark, Israel the power. Israel that can go into Lebanon when it wants to go into Lebanon.

Now he didn’t even see that. Israel can go into Gaza when it wants to. You can go into the West Bank. And so there’s this impression that young people have that Israel is powerful, Israel has the upper hand, and young people, especially young progressives, They like to think about punching up. Right?

We’re gonna defend the poor Palestinians, they’re the victims, and Israel is the bully. And they just don’t have a grasp that Israel is standing for an oppressed people, a threatened people itself. And that I think drives everything in the generational politics.

Linda, is it just that they are misinformed?

Certainly it’s true that things have changed. I was, had a friend over the other night, who is a big Bob Dylan fan, and we were talking about Bob Dylan’s song, which was called neighborhood Bulwark was about the Middle East, and it was, actually about the neighborhood bullies trying to destroy Israel.

Yeah. It was a it was, I meant ironic that title.

Well, no. It was meant that the bullies were the were were the Arab States that were trying to drive Israel.

Right. But he was assuming that listeners would think it was Israel. Right? I don’t

think so. I no. No. I don’t think so. Okay.

Alright.

Maybe it was long enough ago that That wasn’t even a thing.

I saw him singing it to Mary Weather Post, actually. And, you know, there there was a time and I think Will has has hit hit it on on the head when it was understood that Israel was the country under siege, and I think that has changed And I worry about it and I worry about the effect that it’s gonna have, in this election. And I think you know, the kind of tendency of people to to moral equivalence to seeing civilians die in Gaza. And to somehow equate that with the fourteen hundred people who were slaughtered on kibbutzim and in Israel They aren’t the same. There is a difference between actually going after civilians and slitting their throats or shooting them in the head or burning them alive.

And being in a war in which you’re fighting against people who are heavily armed and drop bombs and there is collateral damage.

And hide amongst civilians.

And hide amongst civilians. And so, but I, but I’d I worry about it. And I do think, you know, even the polling data now, and I’m sure Bill is who’s always the expert Jonathan Last poll can can give more information about this, but the polling data is not as strong as I would like to see it in support of, the United States supporting Israel. And we’re just at the beginning. I mean support for for Ukraine was very high at the beginning and it’s not any longer.

So I worry about this. I think it could end up having an impact. And it doesn’t mean that that it’s gonna have a direct impact that they’re gonna go in thinking about that issue. But it can diminish turnout. It can diminish enthusiasm and Absolutely.

Joe Biden needs young people to vote for him and he needs blacks to vote for him and, and other minorities. And I’m I’m worried that this is going to be an issue that is not gonna hold up and is not gonna help him in the long run. Still doesn’t mean I, in any way, would lessen our support for Israel. I think it’s absolutely necessary that USA’d be given. And I don’t like the idea of us trying to tell Israel what’s in its own best interest they should be able to fight the war they need to fight.

Bill, So on the one hand, you know, I do think that many younger people, as Will said, you know, do not have the memory of their in their own lives of Israel being kind of a besieged democratic state in a sea of enemies the way those of us who are older do. And so their different perception is is somewhat understandable. That much having been said, I do wish there was more of more knowledge that Hamas is not asking for a Palestinian state. It we objects the idea of a two state solution, utterly, it wants total war, it wants to eliminate Israel, and so that puts the Israelis in a really different position visa v hamas than, say, toward the Palestinian authority. And there is very little acknowledgement of that when you hear conversation about the issues.

Always well, you know, of course, the answer to this is a two state solution. Well, what if your interlocutor, your enemy, it doesn’t accept that two state solution doesn’t even want it?

Well, if I wanted to be snide, But of course, that would be wrong. I would say that we have finally found an issue on which Hamas and the extreme right of Israeli politics agreed. Alright? There should be a one state solution.

Mhmm.

They

have a modest disagreement about what the state should look like, but, But in fact, they are both against the only possible solution to the overall overall situation. But let’s go back for a minute to young people. Because I think the situation is even more complicated, than we’ve been suggesting so far. If you look at the education of young white progressives, it’s not just that they’re punching up It’s that they’ve been carefully instructed in the theory among other things of settler colonialism. Right?

And by their standards, the state of Israel is filled with subtler colonialists. Which is why their preferred terminology for the kibbutzim, you know, that were destroyed and whose abbot inhabitants were slaughtered on October seventh is not cities. For towns, it’s settlements. As though all of Israel were a mountaintop on the West Bank. So that’s one problem.

A second problem, and I think we have to face up to this. Is that the diversity of young adults in the United States, the rising diversity is having a real impact on their overall outlook. And I’m not just talking about, large, large numbers of Muslim Americans who’ve come into the who’ve come into the country in the past generation. I’m also talking about African Americans. Many of whom see what’s going on in the Middle East through the prism of their experiences in the civil rights movement or through their experiences of racism and equate Israel with white segregationists or even whites in South Africa.

And I am not sure that there’s anything either in experience or in words that may be uttered in the next decade that’s going to change that fundamentally. And so I I am afraid that, when this generation becomes central to the American political system, that we are going to see a big change in American policy towards Israel. And I hope Israeli governments Make an agreement that they can live with with the Palestinians before their greatest backers go soft on the entire issue.

Hey, Mona. Memory failed me. You were absolutely right neighborhood Bulwark, Dylan Song, was met ironically. It was Israel. That he was, saying was the bully, but the point was it really wasn’t.

It was the Arab States. Every now and then I do remember something correctly. Alright. Thank you for that, Linda.

So, Chris, the pressure is is building within the Democratic party, at least right now, there are all kinds of efforts, both, you know, there’s the state department, there’s five hundred alumni of Biden’s twenty twenty presidential campaign. There are senators who have abandoned together writing letters saying that, you know, they they want the president to either support ceasefire or humanitarian pauses and so forth. And so the question is, it’s very hard to say, you know, a year out and much depends on how the war goes, but foreign policy doesn’t usually play a big part in people’s votes. And, you know, you do have to take account of the fact that certainly when people are pointing toward Michigan and saying, Boy, Biden can’t afford to lose the enthusiasm of Arab Americans in that important swing state because he won it narrowly in twenty twenty, but then you have to say, well, yeah, but compared to what? I mean, he’s gonna be, probably, running against Donald Trump, who has doubled down on his promise to, have another Muslim ban.

Yeah. You know, like you said, Mona, it’s so hard to sort of extrapolate a year into the future because gosh, no what will happen with Israel or or generally in the world. But I don’t think this is an issue that is decisive, even in Michigan, where there’s obviously a large Arab American population. I I I don’t think it’s an issue that’s decisive I I tend to think and you mentioned this. I was thinking this last night.

That debt debate had a lot of foreign policy in it. For, for for an audience that I think is not typically super attuned to foreign policy. Certainly, we’ve not seen a lot of presidential elections where voters where that is their top of mind issue. You know, I still think it’s age economy confidence and on the Biden side. And then on the trump side, you know, it’s not as though voters now can say we don’t know what we’re going to get.

Right? In twenty sixteen, you could say, oh, he’s an outsider and yeah, he doesn’t does some stuff. I I don’t really like, but like maybe he’ll change as president and we need something different. Like, we’re now seven years beyond that. You know what you’re getting.

You know, Trump, speaking in in Miami, said that sure if someone, if I’m president and someone is doing something I don’t like, and they’re a political opponent of mine. I’ll say, let’s indict. Mhmm. You know, there’s no artifice if at this point. He Will Saletan New York Times has written about this.

Washington Post has written about it. He will weaponize every element of government from the Department of Justice on down. To target and hurt his political enemies and to benefit himself, whether that’s, you know, financially or otherwise. So it feels to me like given those sort of big choices, I tend to be skeptical that how Joe Biden moderates, if Joe Biden moderate on Israel and a ceasefire and and his support for Israel. I don’t think yes.

For some people that absolutely is the only issue in the same way that for some people on both the left and the right, abortion is the only issue or immigration or gay rights. I don’t think for the casual low information voter that in truth probably makes the difference in Michigan, Arizona, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin based on what we know today, I don’t think where Joe Biden goes on that issue winds up being decisive for those voters.

Okay. Thank you. I would just note that, Bernie Sanders of all people who has never been very friendly to the state of Israel was asked about the ceasefire and said he didn’t see how you could have a ceasefire without Hamas being the winner, which is kinda remarkable. And he got praised by APAC, which he then re Buki. He he he rebuffed the praise from APAC, but, it was a it was a strange moment.

Alright. Let’s turn now to the highlight or low light of the week, and we will start with our guest, Chris Saliza.

I think it this is because I’m I’m preternaturally, attracted to low that I’m gonna pick a low light. And for me, the low light, was Vekramaswamy’s performance in the Republican debate. Last night. I’ve always found him to be sort of a used car salesman and sort of the know it all in the room, but I thought he was particularly irritable and irritating in that debate, whether it was his back and forth with Haley, whether it was his sort of, you know, asking the moderators to apologize for what he deemed the Trump Russia collusion hope You know, look, I think he he effectively his time has come and gone to the extent there was a time for him in this race, you know, during an the first debate. I think there was a curiosity factor about him.

I I think that it’s over for him. I think again, it’s not dissimilar to DeSantis. Republican voters sniffed around and decided they didn’t sort of love what he was selling. I was watching and thinking it scares me a little bit that there is even a teeny constituency in our country for what this guy is saying because he’s so glib. He’s so willing to just contradict something he said five seconds before under the belief that people are too dumb to notice.

He’s so certain of things of which he laughs the knowledge to be certain of, that it worries me that he even got to seven or eight percent in the Republican primary because I think it says something fundamental about our the salesman nature of our politics when there is absolutely nothing beneath the surface. So that was my low light.

A men. A man most likely to deserve a smack in the face. Alright. Will Saletan

Okay. So as the pony guy, I’m gonna give you guys a highlight for me.

Okay.

Alright. So, this one of the things that happened in the elections on Tuesday was that Gabe ammo won the, the race to fill a a congressional seat in Rhode Island. Gabe ammo is a democrat. He’s also Bulwark. I didn’t think too much about this until I saw a subsequent press conference with akeem Jeffries, the minority leader, and Jeffries was it was pointed out to him.

That gave ammo is the sixtieth member of the congressional Bulwark caucus. That is, I think, a high point for the cock for the, the caucus And it prompted me to just run a little bit of math and do the calculation. What is sixty divided by four hundred and thirty five? And the answer is that thirteen point eight percent of the House of Representatives is now black. The population of the United States is only thirteen point six percent black.

According to the Census Bureau. So notwithstanding all of the other problems that we have dealing with race relations and discrimination in this country and inequality It is now a fact that statistically blacks are as well represented in Congress as they are in the population as a whole. I think that is a remarkable milestone. For this country.

Okay. Thank you. Linda Chavez.

Well, I have a quick, low light and a little bit longer highlight. The low light is a story that appeared in the Washington Post this week. US population will start to decline before twenty one hundred census data shows. And what, it reveals is something that I certainly talk about a lot. We’ve talked about some on this show and that is without continued stronger immigration to the United States, we are going to go into rather dramatic population decline.

We’re gonna become like Japan and other and Europe and other places where, we don’t have the population to sustain the kind of economic growth we need. And the numbers that were touted in this piece where we need about a one point five million immigrants to come each year if we are in fact gonna continue to grow. But my highlight is actually, going to be an honor of Damon Linker who is not with us today, but who is of course a regular. He wrote an absolutely terrific piece in the New York Times this week, get to know the influential conservative intellectuals who help explain GOP extremism. I thought this was one of the best pieces, I have read that sort of laid out the, geography told us who the various groups were from the Clairemont Catastrophe as he calls them to some of the other groups, the Christian Reverse revolutionaries, and I think my all time favorite, the bronze age pervert and the Nietzschean fringe.

He goes into these various factions, on the right. He explains their origins, who some of the personalities are, and what they represent. And if you want a primer and trying to understand what’s happening to the right, at least to the right fringe, in intellectual, circles, you couldn’t do better than reading this piece by Damon.

I second that. And, you know, we used to consider people like that to be denizens of the fever swamps, but the fever swamps have gone mainstream So, it’s very useful to know who they are and what they’re saying. Will Saletan.

Well, the problem with climate change is that the fetid waters of the fever swabs also rise. But on a more serious note, while we’ve been recording this program, Joe Manchin has announced that he’s not running for reelection in West Virginia. No, I’m going to speak about this, both as a Democrat and as an American, I think this makes it extremely likely, even more likely than it was before. That Republicans will take over the Senate of the United States, unless there is an entirely unexpected landslide for Joe Biden. And mansion also said, that while I will not be running for reelection to the United States Senate, I will be traveling the country and speaking out to see if there is an interest in creating a movement to mobilize the middle and bring Americans together.

Now that’s either good news or bad news depending on what he means by a movement. If by a movement, he means a group of people who are trying to send to strengthen the center of American politics, then I’m all for it. If he means by that and a moo a movement that takes electoral expression through an independent candidacy, then I think that would be one more problem, for an already beleaguered president. I realized there are people who think that mansion would take more from Trump than he would from Biden. I don’t believe it.

So This is an important development with, ramifications outside the borders of West Virginia.

Okay. Thank you. I would like to mention couple things. So as a possible highlight, there was a story in the New York Times this week about Florida and other schools that are experimenting with banning cell phones during the school day. And they are finding that students actually talk to one another.

You know, it has been a phenomenon that I find really jarring that Apparently, these days when you walk into a middle school cafeteria, which used to be, at least when we were young, you know, the used to be mayhem and, and and loud, you know, cacaffony of sound with kids talking with one another and sometimes yelling. They’re quiet. Because everybody is staring at their phones. So anyway, to solve the, one on one interaction issue, as well as many others, distractions, students, being on TikTok instead of paying attention to what was going on in classroom, they’ve done this experiment. Don’t know if it will be successful, but it seems very worth trying.

So, but highlight that. Now, low light, I have to say I stumbled upon a, hearing senate hearing where Alejandro Maorgas, apparently, the favorite whipping boy of the Republicans was being questioned by a series of senators, including John Kennedy, the, Senator from Louisiana So he began by suggesting this is something that, again, without evidence, but this has now become a right wing talking point since the Hamasas attacks in Israel that Hamas terrorists are coming across the southern border. So let’s let’s hear what he said to secretary Maurecus on that score.

Secretary mayorkers. Since president Biden’s been president Ron DeSantis you have been Secret Podcast many members of Hamas have come into our country across the southern border?

Senator, I’m not aware of a member of Hamas crossing the border?

Have you stopped a member of Hamas from coming in?

Senator, I am not aware of a member of Hamas being encountered at our southern border.

Have you vetted all of the people who have all of the eight point six, eight point four million people who have come into our country illegally. Senator, you and

I have spoken about this for, as you know, we screen and vet individuals whom

we Have you vetted all of them?

Senator, as you know, we screen and vet individuals whom we encounter.

You haven’t vetted all of them. Have you

Senator, as I said, we screen and vet individuals whom we encounter at our board.

I I wanna move on because with respect mister Secret Podcast to quote a public official in my state. It takes you an hour and a half to watch sixty minutes. And you try to filibuster us and use up our time. What is a safe third country policy?

Senator’s Safe Third Country policy is a policy that provides as follows that when an individual is fleeing, their country of origin by reason of fear of persecution. And they traverse, another country that can provide them safety from that fear, then they may not qualify for humanitarian relief in their ultimate country of destination because they Let

me stop you because you’re watching sixty minutes again.

So, of course, he would not accept the answer that he received, and then he went on to cut off the secretary after just a few words accusing, my orcus of filibustering when it was entirely Senator Kennedy who is filibustering, this kind of behavior is so uncivil, so unbecoming, ungracious, frankly, Kennedy was acting like a cad, and I don’t know when, it became absolutely deregard to behave this way. All the damn time. But look, I mean, there have always been moments of ugliness in politics. I’m not naive. I’m not saying there was ever a golden age when people behave beautifully.

All the time. But it has become commonplace now to behave like a jerk, and it is just it’s just disgusting. And so I he is my low light of the week, Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana. And with that, I want to thank our guest, Chris Aliza, for joining us, and, Will Salatin, for sitting in, and of course, to my regulars. And also, I want to acknowledge our producer, Jim Swift, our sound engineer, Jonathan Last, and our great listeners, and we will return next week as every week.